Deposition of thin films on a substrate surface is an important process in a variety of industries including semiconductor processing, diffusion barrier coatings and dielectrics for magnetic read/write heads. In the semiconductor industry, in particular, miniaturization requires atomic level control of thin film deposition to produce conformal coatings on high aspect ratio structures.
Silicon carbon oxynitride (SiCON) is being considered for spacer and etch-stop layer applications due to a low dielectric constant (k). Excellent conformality coverage of dielectric films on high aspect ratio structures is needed as device nodes shrink down below 45 nm. Silicon carbide (oxy)nitride (SiCON/SiCN) films can exhibit some of these favorable qualities, but deposition of SiCON/SiCN films from furnace processes has several drawbacks. For example, these drawbacks include a high temperature requirement (≥550° C.), few capabilities to engineer film compositions and bonding structures. These properties impact wet etch resistance and electrical stability during thermal cycling for front-end of line (FEOL) applications. Films deposited via plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PE-CVD) at lower temperature have poor step coverage due to directionality of the radicals' fluxes.
Accordingly, there is a need for improved methods for depositing various silicon containing films such as SiCN.